Journal of English for Academic Purposes最新文献

This study explores the complex interplay between citation forms and functions within 26 Korean master's theses and 30 research articles in applied linguistics. By extending the analytical boundaries of previous studies, this research examines a broader spectrum of citation patterns by adopting move analysis in specific sections within the Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion (IMRD) framework. The results show that experts predominantly employed non-integral citations with non-human subjects, indicating a sophisticated approach to research synthesis. Student writers commonly utilized integral citations with human subjects, focusing on individual studies. This article further delves into the intricate rhetorical progressions of citation functions within the introduction and discussion sections across the data through various moves in each section. These findings illuminate the multifaceted layers of citation practices within specific disciplinary contexts and subsections of academic writing, offering valuable insights into scholarly discourse. Additionally, the study provides practical pedagogical applications for English academic writing for second language graduate students.

Without proper guidance, some graduate-student writers can misstep and break with the source-use conventions of their disciplines in various ways, including acts that could be considered plagiaristic. Many universities attempt to reduce such missteps with published definitions of plagiarism, guidance in formatting styles, and training in discrete writing skills such as paraphrasing and summarizing; however, the persistence of illegitimate intertextual practices suggests that the issue might be more complex than simple ignorance of conventions or lack of writing skill. This paper reports on a five-year action research project that sought to explore illegitimate intertextuality in research proposals submitted by the members of five diverse cohorts of social science graduate students near the outset of their studies. Data were collected through Turnitin.com similarity reports, discussions with students and instructors, submitted written assignments, and a survey. Over the five years, the project evolved away from simple definition and skill-building toward a focus on socializing students into an academic community of practice. The findings from this project suggest that the core of the issue may be that students hold fundamentally different conceptions of the role of sources in academic texts to those held by their more experienced discourse-community mentors. These results have implications for the training of graduate students in writing in their disciplines, suggesting it may be better to start with the “why” of citation, before moving on to the “what” and the “how.”

This paper examines, with specific reference to English language teacher education in Argentina, the pedagogical intentions which underlie and inform the written feedback practices of an L2 writing teacher educator. The study is part of a larger exploratory-interpretive investigation which adopted a within-site, embedded, multiple-case design, and used data obtained from document analysis and a range of interview types (background interviews, stimulated recall interviews, and reflective interviews). The findings demonstrate the influence of multiple pedagogical intentions on the teacher educator's written feedback practices, some with immediate relevance to L2 writing and others which extended beyond this field. This reinforces the conclusions drawn in previous studies that discuss the impact of pedagogical intentions which are broader than the specific content being taught. Additionally, however, the results expand on our current understanding of how pedagogical intentions operate at different levels by illustrating how micro-level, discipline-specific technicalities are embedded within and signified by macro-level pedagogical intentions. The findings thus highlight the need to imbue feedback with educational principles that go beyond feedback itself, and have implications for L2 writing instruction and assessment, and L2 teacher education.

Teacher-student group conferences (TSGCs) integrate the advantages of peer response with those of individual writing conferences, allowing teachers to comment on learners' drafts while students apprentice into the peer reviewer role by observing the teacher's model. Although several scholars have advocated for TSGCs as a pedagogical practice, TSGCs have received little empirical attention. This study exemplifies how I used TSGCs as an intervention in my graduate-level EAP writing class. Using data from pre/post course surveys, post-TSGC feedback forms, post-course interviews, and final course evaluations, I report on students' perceptions of the TSGCs, including their perceived advantages and disadvantages. Overall, students appreciated the diverse perspectives TSGCs provided and the learning opportunities available when reviewing peers' drafts, receiving feedback, and listening to my comments. Although students' lack of disciplinary knowledge was occasionally problematic, they still saw the utility of TSGCs. Students also outlined strategies they developed for giving feedback if their peers' papers were difficult to understand. Disadvantages identified included difficulties from mixed proficiency levels, time and format limitations, disciplinary distance, quality of peer comments, and cultural differences. I conclude with suggestions for addressing these disadvantages, focusing specifically on important considerations when using TSGCs with graduate students from diverse backgrounds.

This study explores the ways in which English for Specific Purposes (ESP) teachers in three East Asian countries, Vietnam, Japan, and Thailand, understand and utilize top-down and bottom-up (hereafter abbreviated to TD and BU respectively) teaching pedagogies in their classrooms. A judicious combination of either approach in both classroom pedagogy has long been advocated by both theorists and veteran practitioners. However, the authors, when working as teacher trainers, had observed that many ESP teachers reverted almost wholly to bottom-up approaches in their classroom practices. The present study seeks to understand whether or not this perception is accurate and what justifications and/or explanations might be put forward in favour of adopting either approach in ESP milieus. With the participation of 14 ESP teachers in Japan, Thailand, and Vietnam, the study was conducted using a semi-structured written questionnaire which was followed by an open-ended live interview. Emerging and significant themes were then identified and codified by the authors, utilizing a reflective ethnographic approach. Among the most significant findings were 1) that teachers often failed to apply aspects of their training as language teachers into their own classrooms and 2) that the judicious application of either approach was more often performed unconsciously than as a result of any conscious methodological application.

With the development of Web 2.0 we have witnessed an ever-expanding repertoire of digital genres. This brings with it new communicative needs and invites us to reflect on possible ways of teaching digital multimodal composing in EAP courses. Using case study research and genre theory as a heuristic, this article critically discusses the implementation of a pedagogical practice that sought to raise the students' rhetorical consciousness of aspects of genre continuity, evolution and innovation, focusing on digital genres of professional and public science communication. The examination of the digital texts composed by the students shows that several factors (genre awareness, genre knowledge transfer, reliance on acquired content and formal schemata and interdiscursive performance) may play an important role when recontextualising specialised content across genres. The study findings also suggest that while rhetorical consciousness facilitates the processes of recontextualising and repurposing content to reach broad audiences, L1 transfer could negatively influence digital genre composing. In light of the findings, I advocate explicit instruction in “metageneric texts” and methodologies for raising awareness of “inter-genre-al” forms across connected genres online. This instruction could support the students’ professional development and the participatory framework for scientific research advocated by the Open Science agenda.

This study explored the use of author self-reference from cross-linguistic/cultural and cross-disciplinary perspectives in research articles (RAs). Based on a self-built corpus consisting of two disciplines (Computer Science and Linguistics) and two languages (Chinese and English), this study extracted the self-reference markers and compared their uses across the linguistic/cultural and disciplinary corpora. The cross-linguistic/cultural analysis showed that English RAs contain a higher frequency of first-person pronouns, while Chinese RAs tend to utilize more inanimate NPs in both disciplines. The cross-disciplinary comparison identified that English Computer Science texts are characterized by a more explicit authorial persona, while Chinese RAs display a mitigated authorial presence in the text construction. The findings contribute to our knowledge of how the specific disciplinary community and cultural conventions influence writers’ manifestation of their authorial presence.

Despite the pivotal role of ‘comparing present and past research findings' (CPPRF) in both softer and harder sciences, scant attention has been directed to how linguistic resources are used in such comparisons in certain applied sciences, particularly Material Science (MS) and Agricultural Science (AS). Based on a genre analysis and interviews with specialist informants, we examined the prevalence of CPPRF, the circumstances involved, and the salient linguistic resources employed by expert writers in the two disciplines. It was found that CPPRF is markedly more prevalent in the ‘Results and Discussion’ sections of the research articles in AS than those in MS. Agricultural scientists use more author prominent citations, especially after alignment verbs, to accentuate the roles of previous researchers while making new knowledge claims. Experts in both fields, however, employ ‘copula-complex preposition’ and ‘copula-adjective-preposition’ structures expressing commonality to explicitly support previous research findings. In cases of divergences, writers draw on comparative adjectives to tacitly avoid direct conflicts with previous researchers' findings in the process of knowledge creation. It is recommended that specific word combinations be highlighted in relation to writers' attempts to generate knowledge via comparisons of present and previous research outcomes, thus implicitly signalling additional contributions of their studies.

Many higher education institutions support the linguistic needs of ESL students by providing various kinds of tutorial services. Although tutorial interaction has received much research attention, few studies have investigated how tutors and students make decisions about what language skills and activities to focus on during tutorials. In this article, we use conversation analysis (CA) to explore how participants jointly set the tutorial agenda in video recordings from ESL tutorials in dyadic tutor-tutee interactions between an L1 English tutor and L2 tutees at a community college in the United States. We examine participants' interactional practices of initiating agenda management, identifying the tutee's language learning needs, proposing learning activities, and managing disagreement about proposed activities. Our analysis shows how the participants orient to the tutee as the person who is expected to take the lead in agenda setting. From the perspective of a learner-centered EAP pedagogy, agenda management constitutes an important practice because it enables the individualization of the tutorial, which is essential in an instructional environment characterized by a diversity of students' language skills and learning needs. Recognizing the situated, collaborative, and negotiated nature of tutorial interaction can help educational institutions and EAP practitioners further promote learner-centeredness in their practice.

Graduate students often approach research with predefined steps emphasising procedural aspects that occasionally expose their inadequate preparation for research as social practice. The purpose of this paper is to show how an action research (AR) methodology, in conjunction with English for Specific Purposes (ESP) and Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), has facilitated the scaffolding of explicit formal, rhetorical, procedural, and strategic knowledge in research discourse. We followed a cyclical action research model consisting of 1) recognising students' limited understanding of research as a social practice, 2) developing interventions to promote understanding of how language is structured, represented, and negotiated in scientific discourse, 3) results of the intervention, and 4) reflection. Thematic analysis of six participants' data, including their tasks, reflections, and draft proposals, revealed a discernible progression towards scholarly thinking, transformative learning, and the embodiment of scholarly identity. Integrating ESP and SFL frameworks enhanced our ability to guide students through research-specific discourses, moving beyond a purely theoretical understanding to engage in authentic practices. This approach contributed to the cultivation of Communities of Practice (CoP) in which student-faculty collaboration fostered a shared scholarly mindset and facilitated the gradual integration of students into these academic communities.